Mono-epoxide to mono-aldehyde rearrangements are well known in the chemical arts. However, di-epoxide rearrangement to di-aldehyde processes are less known. For example, common Lewis acids and Bronsted acids lead to oligomerization and the production of complex mixtures of products when a difunctional rearrangement is attempted.
Di-aldehydes are particularly useful as chemical intermediates to make material such as enol ethers. It would be desirable to have an efficient process to make dialdehydes from diepoxides. The invention disclosed herein describes a two-step process to make a dialdehyde wherein a diepoxide is first hydrolyzed with an alcohol solvent to an intermediate which is then subjected to a double-Pinacol rearrangement to obtain a dialdehyde.